Just took Erjang (www.erjang.org) for a spin.
I ran the ring_test example and above is a simple plot of performance compared with Erlang.
First is java with -server option second java, then erlang and finally erlang with hipe.
Note that in this case hipe is actually slower, and java with server option is also slower.
I think it is amazing that Erjang is only ~30% slower, great work
